


Divergence

by KaCole



Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Action/Adventure, Canon Compliant, Gen, Humor, Science Fiction, Time War
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-02
Updated: 2018-02-02
Packaged: 2019-03-12 18:54:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 7,749
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13553496
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KaCole/pseuds/KaCole
Summary: The Twelfth Doctor and Clara Oswald get tangled up with a divergence cannon -- a deadly weapon left over from the Time War. They have to get it as far away from the TARDIS as possible, but they didn't intend young Harrison Sadler to find it and for his life to unravel so drastically. In a desperate race against time, Clara and the Doctor must stop Harrison from finding the cannon, before the whole planet is consumed in flames-- and them with it.





	1. Where to Next?

**Author's Note:**

> This story was my contribution to the charity anthology Time Shadows 2: Second Nature.  
> Sadly, the anthology has been pulled from sale, so my stint as a 'published author' lasted about a week. Mind you, I've got the book on my shelf, and I feel pretty proud to have been involved in the project at all. That does mean of course that I am free to share the story with you guys on AO3.  
> {{{{ Enjoy! }}}}}

“Where to now, then, Clara?” the Doctor asked. “How about a trip to the crystal caves of Kastellel Three?” He took a pace sideways, turning a monitor protruding from the console towards her. “The dual pulsars Geminga and BO-three-five-five are generating particularly spectacular particle clouds right now. Look.” He pointed at two small, bright spheres.  Streams of violet, blue and pink light poured from each, bursting outwards into space. At the point where the streams converged, an explosion of colours swirled across the screen.

He took her hand and guided her finger to the middle of the colours. “We could materialise right here and watch from the doors.”

Clara pondered. She really _should_ get back to school before her hair grew much longer. There had been a few awkward questions from other members of staff last time. But another adventure was hard to resist. The pulsars did look spectacular.

“I’m pretty tired, but I could shower and crash in the TARDIS. It will still be here tomorrow, right?”

“I’ve got a time machine. Of course it will still be here tomorrow.”

She grinned, tugging playfully on his hand. She wanted this to go on forever, spinning through time and space–skipping more and more of her dull, regular life—because _nothing_ compared to travelling with the Doctor.

He grinned that owlish grin of his. “All right, I’ll—”

Without warning, the TARDIS pitched hard right. Clara staggered, grabbing at the railing around the central dais. Then the ship plunged down with a sickening lurch. Books toppled from the shelves. The central column laboured out a grinding rasp.

“What’s going on?” Clara yelled.

“I don’t...” The Doctor stopped and then darted to the other side of the console. “Something’s stuck on the outer shell.” He flicked on an external scanner. “No, no, no, not one of those!”

Clara stumbled across the shaking TARDIS. “What is it?”

“It’s a divergence cannon.” The Doctor slammed his fist into the console. “Left over from the Time War.”

“That doesn’t sound good,” Clara said.

“It isn’t. They’re unpredictable and dangerous. We better get out of the vortex and find a safe place to power down.”

The Doctor began punching a series of buttons. The juddering clattered Clara’s teeth together. Her eyes were soon streaming as wisps of blue smoke from the overwrought console gathered in the air.

Clara looked at the coordinates he’d set. Her flat. He was taking the screaming, roaring, out-of-control TARDIS _to_ _her_ _flat_. “Wait!” she yelled. “Not—”

The landing brakes groaned. The TARDIS slammed to a halt, throwing Clara to the floor.

The Doctor dashed out of the doors. He returned a few seconds later with his red jacket smouldering. “I’ve got it off the shell. Quick, we need to power down.” He flicked a few buttons and then darted over to offer Clara his hand.

Struggling to her feet, she glimpsed blue flames through the TARDIS doors. “Doctor, what did you do with that cannon?”

“I threw it away from the TARDIS, of course. We need to get out while she shuts her systems down to cut the cannon off from its power source. Hurry.”

Clara sprinted through the doors and into her darkened flat. She jolted to a halt and stared open-mouthed. Something resembling a large space gun, with a broken barrel and half the trigger mechanism missing, lay against the back cushions on her sofa, glowing blue, tendrils flame licking up about the device's fragmented shaft. The TARDIS doors slammed shut behind her. At the same time, the blue glow around the cannon faded. The flames consuming Clara’s furniture, however, did not.

Clara dashed into the kitchen, yanked her fire blanket off the wall by the cooker, and ran back to the lounge. Thrusting the blanket into the Doctor’s hands with a silent scowl, she bolted back to the kitchen for a bucket.

Running water into the bucket, she had several seconds to decide just how much hell the Doctor deserved for this. Getting her tied up, locked in alien prisons, even covered in alien gloop was one thing. Burning her sofa took recklessness to a whole new level.

*          *          *          *          *

Clara and the Doctor sat on the floor, legs outstretched, with their backs resting against the side of the TARDIS. Chilly night air blew in through the open window, flapping the sofa’s loose fabric to reveal the exposed springs. The room still stank of smoke.

Clara turned the full force of her scowl on the Doctor. “I can’t believe you did that,” she said. “There’s not a scratch on the TARDIS, but my sofa is...” she searched for an appropriate word, but couldn’t find one rated PG, so she just waved a defeated hand at the soaked, blackened fabric of what used to be her couch. “I only just finished paying for it.”

“Clara, I really am very sorry. This was the first place I thought of.” He stopped fiddling with the cannon and put it down on his lap.

“If you could get inside the TARDIS, I’d tell you to bugger off,” she said. “I suppose I’m stuck with you now until the power’s back?”

He offered a sheepish grin.  

Clara really couldn’t stay cross with him for long. They’d been in much worse scrapes than this. “Is that thing safe now?” she asked, pointing at the cannon’s cracked, blackened shell.

“Quite safe, as long as there’s no time-sensitive objects around.”

“What did it do? In the Time War, I mean.”

“It splinters space-time, extrapolating all possible futures into separate divergence bubbles.” He rubbed his temples wearily. Clara knew thinking of the Time War still pained him. “Whoever’s in charge of the cannon dismisses the futures they don’t want—and selects the future they do want. That version of reality is then forced into existence.”

“That’s a terrible weapon.” Clara shuddered at the thought of someone coldly selecting this future or that, stealing the days to come by their choices.

“Yes, it is,” the Doctor said. His tone darkened. “I thought I dealt with them all years ago. I’ll dismantle it. By the time the TARDIS powers up, it won’t be a threat to anyone.”

“Look, I need to get cleaned up and sleep. You make yourself at home, okay?” She paused. “Um, you don’t need to sleep, do you?”

He shook his head quickly. “No, no, a quick nap will see me fine.”

“Good. We’ll get rid of this,” she kicked at the carcass of her poor sofa, “in the morning.” Goodness only knew how she’d explain _that_ to her family.


	2. Chapter 2

Clara woke blearily to the sound of ringing and the sight of the Doctor hovering near her bed.

“Your phone won’t stop making this terrible noise. It’s very distracting,” he said, handing it to her.

She groaned. It was her stepmum. “Linda, I’m not even up, it’s seven a.m.”

“She called four times,” the Doctor added, backing out of her bedroom.

“Is that a man’s voice? Are you alone?” Linda asked.

“Linda, I’m almost thirty years old. If I’ve got a man here it’s none of your damn business,” Clara snapped.

“Well! You can introduce me, then. I’m on my way up the stairs. Your lift is broken _again_.”

“What?” Clara sat bolt upright. “No! I mean. I’m alone. There’s no one here…”

Linda had already hung up.

Clara leaped out of bed. “Doctor!” She scrambled to the lounge. To her relief, the TARDIS door was open again and he’d dismantled the divergence cannon.

“We need to get that out of here,” she said, pointing at the heap of gun parts on her carpet. Then she added, “And my sofa. And you. Now!”

“We do?” The Doctor looked up in mild surprise.

“Yes we do. I’m not in the mood for the Spanish Inquisition from Linda. Can you get that lot in the TARDIS?”

“Not the cannon. It might be inert now, but if we take any part of it inside a time machine it will light up like a Venflaxian Festival tree.”

Clara grabbed the barrel and a handful of the circuits and dashed back into her room. “We’ll hide it under my bed. Bring the rest,” she called over her shoulder.

When they’d cleared the floor of space debris, Clara grabbed the end of the sofa. “Let’s get this in the TARDIS, and you can buzz off and dump it somewhere, yeah?” She started to drag it single-handedly towards the TARDIS.

The Doctor shot her a quizzical look. “Okay… but what’s the rush? Linda’s met me before. I thought—”

Clara flushed. She remembered _that_ meeting only too well. Linda hadn’t let her forget it. “Yes, well, I’m fed up with her constant criticism. My flat isn’t tidy enough. I’m not head of department yet. I’m thirty and single. Which, apparently, gives her licence to set me up with Matthew Flint, the deputy bank manager.” Clara screwed her face up at the thought.

“I’m sure _Matthew Flint_ is a perfect bore. He sounds terrible,” the Doctor agreed.

Between them, they hefted the remains of the charred sofa towards the TARDIS. As Clara stepped backwards into the ship, the couch wedged itself part way through.

Clara grunted, and shoved at the sofa. It wouldn’t move. “Turn it on its side,” she commanded.

The Doctor grinned. “Yes, boss.” Then he let go of his end of the sofa and waved his hand towards the hall. “You should stand up to _her_ like that.”

Clara twitched her nose. “It’s her passive aggressive rubbish I can’t deal with. She drags Dad into it. Sometimes, it’s better to just go along with her.” Clara tugged hard at the sofa. Linda would be here any moment after huffing her way up seven flights of stairs, and she didn’t have the energy or the patience to explain the Doctor to her today.

They manoeuvred the sofa onto its arm, tipped it over the threshold and let it crash into the console room.

At that moment the doorbell rang.

“Good, now you can...” Clara waved her arm at the dematerialisation controls.

A blue flash sparked up from behind a sofa cushion, lighting the whole base in a blue glow.

“Oh, no, no, no!” the Doctor said, diving at the furniture. He flipped it over and ripped off the charred cushions.

The doorbell chimed three times.

The TARDIS doors slammed shut. A small, blue blur zipped up between the cushions. The Doctor lunged for it. Spinning away, almost gleefully, it dodged him and hovered over the console, where it spun in the air and buzzed.

Clara stared at it, almost mesmerised. It reminded her of the Golden Snitch, only much, much bluer, and no _Harry Potter_ on his Nimbus 2000 to catch it.

Leaping towards the console, the Doctor yelled, “No, you _don’t_.”

The blue blur darted away.

“What is it? What’s happening?” Clara yelled. The central column started to rise and fall. The ball of trouble bounced off a bookcase, sending a shower of blue sparks across the console room.

“It’s part of the divergence cannon. I think it’s...”

They both ducked as it catapulted itself across the room. The air in its wake glinted and flickered, like an angry blue comet orbiting the TARDIS console.   

The Doctor groaned. “It’s the cannon’s CPU. I thought that part was lost in the vortex...”

Clara took cover under the console. “What’s it doing?” she called to the Doctor.

“It’s set us in motion. We’re in the vortex. But don’t worry, I have a plan.” He flicked coordinates into the console, and then disappeared up the steps into the heart of the TARDIS.

The blue ball of trouble buzzed over Clara’s head, and then pinged up towards the ceiling, before starting off on dizzying circuits of the room. After a few frenetic laps, the orb came to a halt, hovering just above the console, spinning faster and faster. Clara flung her hands over her eyes. Arcs of blue light streaked from the snitch to the panel. Acrid blue-grey smoke hung in the air.

“Oh, no, you don’t!” The Doctor stood at the top of the steps with a cricket bat against his shoulder. “Clara, get ready to open the door.” He pounced down the stairs, wielding the bat in front of him like a sword.

Clara closed her eyes for a second. _Okay, it’s fine. If he can beat Robin Hood with a spoon, he’s good for six with a cricket bat._ She opened one eye as he stalked the CPU across the console room. The device dodged and wove its way around, as if avoiding his inexpert lunges.

He swiped, missed and staggered forward. “Okay, I got this. That was just practice,” he said, regaining his balance and some of his dignity. He straightened his back. “Get ready to open the door.”

The CPU whizzed past Clara’s head and crashed into another bookcase. Pages exploded into the air and then fluttered to the floor around her. She jumped up, dived forward and poised her finger over the door-release button.

“Ready?” she yelled to the Doctor.

He grinned. As the CPU darted past him he swung. “Now!” he bellowed, smashing it with the bat. With a high-pitched whine, it sparked over Clara’s head and out of the TARDIS. They both rushed to the door to see where it landed.

Outside, a dense jungle of tangled trees was briefly illuminated by a blue flare, and then all evidence of the CPU faded as it fell somewhere in the undergrowth.

The Doctor leaned against the door, grinning, with the cricket bat over his shoulder.

Clara shot him a coy smile. “Not bad.” She tapped the bat, just above a burn mark the size of a satsuma where he’d smacked the CPU. “Not bad at all.” Then she turned sharply. “Is the TARDIS going to switch off again?”

“No. When everything rebooted... while you were sleeping... I recalibrated the phase dynamics on the outer shell. It should be shielded from the CPU now.”

“Should be?”

“Well, it’s not an _exact_ science. There might be some residual power,” he mumbled.   

Clara surveyed the jungle. A canopy of green trees towered above them, reaching into a cloudless, orange sky enveloping the forest a warm, golden glow. “Where do you think it landed?”

The Doctor made a click with the corner of his mouth, and then pulled a small transceiver from his pocket. “It’s not so much where,” he said, “as when. We have to find the CPU before it can latch onto anyone.”

“Okay . . . so someone else finding it would be bad? How bad?”

He turned to her. “Remember that book with the small hairy-footed creatures? One of them found a ring and it poisoned his mind?”

“You mean Gollum?”

The Doctor nodded. “Yes. I think it’s fair to say anyone holding the divergence cannon’s CPU over a period of time would find it . . . _seductive_.”

“What would happen?”

“I don’t know for sure. But, it’s possible they could manipulate reality.”

“That sounds bad. We better...”

The Doctor grabbed her arm as she started off into the bush. “Clara, I admire your get up and go, but,” he nodded at her clothes, “you’re still in your pyjamas. You might want to get dressed.”

Clara blushed furiously. “Right. Okay. Just a minute.” She dashed halfway across the console room, and paused. “Don’t go leaving the Shire without...”

“Without what?”

“Without me.”

  
  



	3. Chapter 3

“While you were dressing,” the Doctor said when Clara returned, “I found out a few things about this planet. It’s a human colony, a few hundred years in your future. There are a number of good-sized cities on the planet, but we’re in a remote spot. Nearest city’s a few miles in that direction.” He pointed beyond the clearing they had landed in and towards a barely visible pathway through the trees.

“Come on then,” Clara stepped onto a layer of damp leaves. The steamy rainforest air was laced with a sweet, floral note that reminded her of summer evenings in her gran’s garden. The warmth had her rolling up her sleeves before she had taken a few paces outside of the TARDIS.

The Doctor laid a hand on her shoulder. “Look. Don’t… just, let’s take care. There’s no telling what trouble that CPU might cook up.”

“We better hurry up and find it then,” she said, shooting him a sideways look. This was so much more fun than dealing with Linda.

He sighed, almost inaudibly, and then nodded. He released her shoulder and followed her.

Clara felt a bounce in her step as she traversed the leaf-covered clearing. The sun, dappled by the high canopy of fleshy leaves, painted patterns on the forest floor. She could be anywhere, on one of a million, billion worlds. Her heart fluttered at the thought of stepping where no 21st-century human had gone before. She grinned back at the Doctor, and she could see—by the boyish grin playing on his lips—that the excitement had grabbed him, too.

“What’s this planet called?” she asked.

He quickened his pace to catch her up. “Arawath Prime. There’s a huge trading centre on the southern continent, but this area’s mainly agriculture.”

“Good, perhaps aren’t too many people around to find it.”

Clara grabbed his arm and pointed at a shimmery blue light sparkling through the trees. They pushed on through the tangle of shrub blocking their path, and, as they closed in, Clara heard a faint crackling. The Doctor stamped down some undergrowth, clearing a path for them to step out of the jungle and onto a shallow beach. A wide expanse of an inland lake spread before them.

Clara gasped. A sprinkling of tiny blue lights clustered in the air a couple of metres above the high-tide mark, shimmering like fairy lights on a Christmas tree. As the Doctor and Clara watched, each light stretched into a crack the length of her finger.

“What’s happening?” she asked.

He strode towards the lights peering through his sonic sunglasses. Then he turned towards her and shook his head. “Divergence,” he said. “We’re too late. It’s feeding from the residual energy it took on while it was in the TARDIS. Clara, take my hand. We mustn’t get separated. The divergence map is formulating, and we’re standing right in the middle of it!”

Clara ran to his side and grasped his hand. Just once, she thought, it would be nice if she _didn’t_ get carted off anywhere.

The noise on the lakeside whipped up as the cracks continued to expand. When one touched the lake’s surface, the water fizzed and popped, sending steam rising in clouds.

“Are they hot?”

Although he was right beside her, the Doctor had to shout so she could hear him over the roar. “For the time being. It’s when they’ve cooled down we need to worry.” He waved his free hand at the cracks all around them. “After this expansion phase they’ll achieve interstice. After that...”

A close-by crack speared the beach, spraying sand and a shower of glassy pebbles into the air. The Doctor pulled Clara sharply around, shielding her from the worst of the debris with his back.

When Clara opened her eyes, his red jacket was speckled with black where the hot stones had peppered him.

She flicked ash and fragments of stone from his shoulders. “What happens now?” she asked. Ten separate cracks, heat radiating from each, surrounded them.

“The controller, whoever it was that found the CPU, discards the realities they don’t want, and makes their choice,” the Doctor said.

“Changes the future?”

“Distorts reality. Same thing.”

“What do we do?” Clara gasped.

“We need to scan the map,” he said. “Stay close.” He approached the closest fissure.

A blurry, grainy image resolved through the crack. Beyond, a bearded man, in a tailored grey suit, sat at a long dining table in an elegant room. A photograph of a tall glass-fronted tower block hung on the wall over his shoulder. Another man, who reminded Clara of an old-fashioned butler, brought a meal on a tray and set it on the table. The man barely glanced up from the touch-screen data pad on the table in front of him.

“Who’s that?” Clara asked the Doctor.

“I don’t know for sure, but probably—” the Doctor paused, as half a dozen blue fairy-light cracks winked into existence around the seated man. The man looked up, examined each in turn, and then, with a flick of his finger, swiped them away, until only one remained. He smiled, and poked his finger deep into that glinting light.

As he did, his surroundings shifted. The table seemed a little larger. What Clara had taken to be a photograph of a tower building now seemed to be an oil painting of the same view, and beside _that_ was an even bigger painting; a portrait of the man who was still seated at his table. Through the window, Clara saw an elegantly styled garden, with an expanse of trimmed lawn.

“Uh oh,” the Doctor said. “We’ve found the focal point. But this is his future.”

“What just happened?”

“He collapsed the divergence bubble,” the Doctor said.

Clara squinted at him; that answer didn’t make a jot of sense.

He rolled his eyes, before explaining, “He swipes away the realities he doesn’t want, and then selects the one he does want. He changes the future.” The Doctor pulled on Clara’s hand. “We need to find the first time he interacts with the CPU.”

They moved through the growing storm towards another fissure. The orange sky darkened, and grey clouds rolled in with the wind.

Through the tear, Clara saw the same man; perhaps a few years older, seated in what looked like a boardroom. A picture identical to the one they’d seen earlier in the house, hung on one wall. Behind him was a logo, _SadTech Industries,_ in huge gold lettering.

Clara took a step closer, but the Doctor held her back.

“I want to see the name under that portrait,” she said.

The Doctor retrieved a pair of binoculars from his pocket, glanced through them quickly, and then handed them to her. Through them she could easily see the name on the gold plaque beneath the portrait: _Harrison Sadler, CEO SadTech_.

Harrison Sadler spoke animatedly to the men and women seated around the table. Not one of them met his eyes. He jumped to his feet as a scattering of blue lights appeared, waving several away with irritated swipes. Clara watched the people around the table react to his erratic arm-waving. The woman closest to him exchanged glances with her neighbour and stood up as if to speak, but Harrison didn’t seem to notice. The room quickly cleared, leaving Harrison Sadler alone, waving his arms at the blue lights buzzing around his head.

“Can other people see those cracks?” Clara asked the Doctor.

“No, just him. He’s the focal point. We can see them because we’re time-sensitive.”

“They must think he’s hallucinating,” Clara said.

“The constant divergence and selection process will overwhelm him. The only way he can get the lights to stop is to choose.”

The air became colder, and Clara shivered. The orange sky had darkened with grey clouds, and a cool wind sent ripples across the lake.

“We need to find the earliest...” the Doctor began.

From the corner of her eye, Clara saw another scar-like tear forming. It quickly widened. She tried to pull the Doctor aside, but his foot clipped the edge of the tear and he stumbled.

“Woah!” Clara exclaimed, as she clung to his hand. It was as if an invisible rope had wrapped itself around his leg and was dragging him toward the tear. “Look out!” she yelled above the wind.

The Doctor turned his head to the rift. In that moment, she thought she saw a hundred calculations running through his head. He looked back at her. “Let go!” he said.

“What? No!” She scrambled for a foothold on the beach, but found none. They were both being dragged towards the pulsing tear in the fabric of reality. On the other side, Harrison Sadler stood entwined in a blue vortex of swirling light. He was a shouting, ragged man now; his grey suit worn thin, his straggly hair down to his shoulders, his beard matted. His eyes horrified Clara most, though—wild, darting around desperately—they were the eyes of a man who knew no peace. And the Doctor was being dragged towards _that_. “Hold on!” she cried, digging her free hand into the sand.

The Doctor shook his head. “Take these,” he thrust the sunglasses at her. “Find point zero, where Harrison made first contact with the CPU. _You_ have to stop him finding it in the first place.”

“I won’t let you go!” She thrust her heels hard into the sand in one last desperate attempt to stop his relentless progress into the frenzy. 

The Doctor was in the tear up to his waist now. “Clara! We can’t fix this if we’re both in there,” he said firmly. His voice exuded reason, calming her, somehow. “Let me go.”

Clara looked at the sunglasses. “Clara Oswald, you make an excellent Doctor. You can do this,” he said.

He trusted her. He trusted her with his life. Clara nodded once. “I’ll save you,” she said, squeezing his hand tightly for a moment. Then she let go.

*          *          *          *          *

The Doctor watched Clara vanish. The roaring wind transformed into the buzz of confined static, and the beach shifted and became the room in which he and Clara had watched Harrison eat his breakfast. But the fine table was now cracked down the middle, and, instead of the golden morning light pouring in through the windows, a blue, fizzing storm raged inside the four walls. The curtains were in tatters and the broken windows looked out, not onto fine lawns, but onto a thick mass of shrubs. Harrison Sadler paced among the ruins.

His eyes darted around, tracking the swarm of lights. “Not you,” he muttered, and swiped away a light. “Nor you. Go.” He swiped four lights away in turn, but dozens remained. “I’ll find it. Then I’ll be done. No more!”

The Doctor stepped toward Harrison. “I’m the Doctor. Let me help you,” he said. This was _his_ fault. He’d smashed the divergence cannon out of the TARDIS and into this man’s life.

Harrison looked up at him wildly. “I’m not mad,” he said. “They’re here. I have to choose. I have to choose.”

The Doctor stepped closer. “What do you have to choose?”

“The right one. The last one.” Harrison swept away another batch of lights with jerky, shaking hands. “Where, where, where?” he muttered, and set off around the room at a frantic pace.

“Maybe I can help you find it?” the Doctor offered.

“No. Yes. I’m done,” Harrison snapped. He turned on the Doctor with a sudden burst of speed and grabbed him by the lapels. Up close, the Doctor saw what he had taken for old age was in fact, neglect. Harrison’s hair and beard were tangled and matted, but his skin—under a layer of grime—had very few wrinkles.

This man’s life had been consumed by the endless barrage of choices.

The Doctor raised his palms in a gesture of surrender. “I know how this works. You see different realities through these cracks. One has pudding for dessert, the other has an apple. It’s easy to choose. Who wants an apple for afters?”

Harrison stared at the Doctor. “How do you know that?”

“It always starts small. How long was it before they appeared again?”

“A whole year,” Harrison said, in a moment of clarity. “I thought I imagined the whole thing. Only, the next time there were three choices. So I thought, why not choose the reality where I score top in the test?”

Suddenly, Harrison shoved the Doctor backwards and took off in a loping run. “Choose, choose, choose,” he called, swiping away the fragments of blue light as he passed.

The Doctor regained his balance and followed Harrison careering across the room. “So it went on. Reality splitting and reforming around the choices you made.” Harrison wasn’t listening. The Doctor knew how it must have gone; each choice just a little harder than the last. Then the space between the choosing getting shorter.

“I can help, if you let me,” the Doctor called.

“If you want to help, start looking… for the final choice.”

A jolt ran through the Doctor. “And what’s that?” he said carefully. “What’s the final choice?”

“Peace,” Harrison said. “No lights. No choices.”

“And how will I know when I see it?” the Doctor asked.

“Flames,” Harrison said whispered. “All the world in flames.”  


	4. Chapter 4

 

On the beach, the wind tore at Clara’s clothes and the grey sky cast a pallid, murky light. Cracks in reality surrounded her, with more appearing each moment. How on Earth was she supposed to find point zero among all these?

Clara put on the sunglasses and turned her whole body around. She felt as if a tone was vibrating inside her mind. It changed as she swept past each crack, becoming higher in pitch, until it was a terrible, irritating, whine, and then dipped again. So, assuming the highest tone was closest to point zero—her best guess—that narrowed things down. A set of three cracks, two at the water’s edge, and one disappearing under the lake, gave off the highest tone.

Through the first crack she saw a child’s bedroom. A dark-haired boy in pyjamas held the CPU. It glowed steadily now; the angry crackle and fizz were gone. It looked like it had found a home. The boy looked up sharply and then tucked it under his pillow. Clara guessed, although she could hear nothing, a command had come to brush his teeth. He scurried off out of the bedroom. So that was early—probably soon after he found the CPU—but still not point zero.

The wind buffeted Clara, and she struggled against it with unsteady legs. From the cloud-blackened sky above, blue lightning arced to the surface of the lake. The water transformed into a brilliant blue and then faded back to murky grey. The air smelled of ozone. Instinct urged her back, but the next tear was closer to the lake, so she pushed forwards. She had to save the Doctor.

Through the next crack, she saw the boy again, a teen now—no beard, but recognisably Harrison Sadler. Three or four tiny lights floated around his head as he lay on his bed. He watched them for a while, and then he playfully swiped three away, and tapped a finger on the remaining one. With a contented smile, he rolled over and closed his eyes.

Cold water lapped at Clara’s feet, soaking through her shoes, as the wind whipped the lake. She shivered against the biting cold. She turned the glasses to the third tear, which disappeared under the lake. The high-pitched beep pierced the storm.

Point zero.

On the other side of the tear, the sun shone over a calm, turquoise lake, and a boy floated on his back in the water. He flipped over and then pointed excitedly at something glowing blue on the lake bed. The boy waved animatedly shoreward and then dived under the water.

A minute later, he resurfaced, took several breaths and then plunged under again. Clara’s heart sank. Young Harrison Sadler was diving for the CPU as if it were lost treasure or a precious pearl.

Clara tore off her jacket and kicked her feet out of her shoes. Then she took a deep breath. If she wanted to get the Doctor back and stop young Harrison’s life going to hell, she would to have to dive into the lake’s icy, dark waters, and get that CPU before he did.

*          *          *          *          *

Harrison Sadler dashed feverishly across the room, batting away unwanted bubbles until only a dozen remained. How did he choose each time, the Doctor wondered, as he examined the closest tear. At just a couple of centimetres across, each window to the future was very small. But if he closed one eye and focused, it was like looking through a pinhole camera.

As he trained his brain to see through the rips in reality, diverging, fragmented futures appeared all around him. Some were images of Harrison in varying forms; smartly dressed or in rags, and many states in between. Within the myriad of choices, there were people the Doctor didn’t know. He saw many faces; happy at this choice or anguished at another. The Doctor saw planes crash into the ocean and earthquakes swallow cities. He recoiled. Were _these_ the choices Harrison had been faced with, day in, day out? Choosing who lives and who dies? No wonder it had driven him mad.

Harrison stumbled around the room. “Flames. Only flames now,” he said, in a sing-song voice. “We all sleep. It’s the only way.”

The Doctor began to realise, with cold horror, what Harrison’s peace really _was_. “You’re looking for a future that ends in fire for everyone?”

Harrison offered a sad smile. “Soon be time for bed,” he said. Then he fixed his gaze on a tear at the far side of the room. He raised a finger. “That one.”

The Doctor squinted at the tiny blue tear. An inferno raged inside; a planet consumed in flames. Harrison set to work swiping the other blue lights away. The Doctor leaped at him, ready to pin his arms, but the ragged man dodged out of his grasp.

“Clara, be quick,” the Doctor muttered.

If Clara didn’t find point zero before Harrison made his final choice, every man, woman and child on Arawath Prime would burn.

*          *          *          *          *

Clara strode into the freezing water up to her waist. She didn’t stop to think about the cold. She took two good breaths and then plunged towards the lake floor. The light was better near the base of the tear, for the day beyond, a window into the past, was a bright summer afternoon. She forced her eyes open, even though they stung, and looked through the tear in reality.

Harrison Sadler, in bright red swimming trunks, scrabbled between two rocks on the bottom of the lake. A blue light radiated from the crevice. The rocks were right on the junction between Clara’s reality and Harrison’s.

Marking the spot well in her memory, Clara zipped back to the surface. In just a few strokes she gulped in fresh air. The wind whipped her hair and the sky roiled with angry black clouds. Lightning crashed into the beach and sent a shockwave through the lake. Clara took two breaths and then plunged back down again.

Harrison was still trying to get his fingers around the CPU. With two powerful strokes Clara placed herself opposite him. She reached out a hand and shoved him away from the rocks. He floated backwards, eyes wide in surprise, and then turned and kicked his little legs furiously, propelling himself to the surface.

Good, Clara thought, go make a sand castle and leave me to deal with this. She wiggled her hand between the stones. Her fingers touched the surface of the CPU, still a tantalising blue, glowing magically in the water. No wonder Harrison wanted it.

She jammed her arm further in to get her fingers around the sphere. She heard a muffled crack, and the whole lake bed shuddered. The rocks shifted and clenched around her forearm. She grasped the sphere and tried to yank her arm out.

Her arm wouldn’t move.

Okay, don’t panic. She pulled again.

Nothing. She looked up, to see Harrison again, floating in the clear blue waters, staring at her curiously. Then he peered between the rocks at the blue shimmering orb.

She shook her head frantically, panic tightening her chest, unable to communicate with him except through the desperation in her eyes. She tried to bend her knee up into the rock to get more leverage and yank her arm free. Fear tore through her like a hurricane.

Harrison backed out of sight, and Clara heaved her arm, ignoring her skin scraping on the rock’s rough surface. Her lungs felt ready to explode. The cold water’s deadly embrace pressed around her. She closed her eyes. One word echoed in her mind. _Doctor_.

*          *          *          *          *

The Doctor wrestled Harrison to the floor. “We can fix this. You have to give my friend time,” he yelled.

Harrison laughed, the howling laugh of a man so far over the edge he’d lost sight of reason. “Time? No time. She’s drowning.”

Harrison pointed at the two remaining lights sparkling above their heads. In one, fire raged, a planet wide conflagration. In the other, Clara was struggling, submerged in murky water, eyes wide with terror.

Harrison traced his finger back and forth in the air under the two splits in reality. “Choices,” he said. “Bad choices. Still have to choose.”

The Doctor roared in fury. “Not Clara! Not in any reality!”

Harrison laughed. “This is a good one. Let your friend die, or the planet burn. Which do you choose?” he gibbered, shaking with laughter.

The Doctor’s hearts clenched. He would not let Clara die. He lunged at Harrison and they both tumbled to the floor. Harrison brought his knee sharply up into the Doctor’s stomach. With a grunt, the Doctor pulled himself and Harrison upright. He forced then man’s hand towards the crack and wiped away the inferno.

“One left,” Harrison said. He let his hands flop down to his side. “It doesn’t matter what you do. It starts all over again,” he whispered. “Get it right next time. Everything ends.” He looked up at the Doctor. “Sorry about your friend.”

The Doctor gripped Harrison’s hand. “There’s one thing you haven’t taken into account,” he said, as he poked their joined fingers to select the last reality bubble. “I’m the Doctor, and I save people.”

*          *          *          *          *

Reality folded around him and suddenly the Doctor stood at the lakeside again in a blizzard of sand.

He flung his coat to the ground, kicked off his shoes, and dived into the water.

One of Clara’s arms floated upwards, and her hair billowed out like a crown. He grasped her hand and pulled himself towards her. Her face had reddened with the strain of holding her breath. In seconds, reflex would compel her to breathe out and the icy waters would flood her lungs.

He anchored himself with one arm around her waist, pinched her nose, and covered her mouth with his. She let her breath go, and then he breathed out steadily, careful not to overfill her lungs, for he knew his capacity was much greater than hers.

That would buy him two minutes, no more. He met her eyes for a moment and then examined the rocks trapping her arm. She was wedged in tight. He pushed the rocks. One was far too big to contemplate moving, but the other, about the size of a dustbin, might budge. He shoved it as hard as he could.

It didn’t shift. He adjusted his position and tried again. It just wouldn’t move.

The Doctor squeezed Clara’s hand, thrust himself up to the surface to suck in more air, and then back to her side. He repeated the kiss of life, and moved to the other side of the rock to try and manoeuvre it from there. It would not budge. He smashed it with his fist. He wouldn’t let Clara die. Not here, not today, not on his watch!

He became aware of two more figures in the water; a small, dark haired boy, pulling the hand of an older man, perhaps his father, and pointing at Clara. The man nodded. He tapped the boy’s chest and pointed to the surface.

The Doctor wedged his feet against the large rock and shoved. The man dug his feet in the sand and pulled. Clara struggled furiously, but although the rock moved a fraction she couldn’t break free.

Then the little boy reappeared. He wedged his feet against the small rock and took Clara’s arm. The Doctor and the man pulled and heaved.

At last, it moved a fraction. In a blur, Clara and the boy were swirling upwards in a cloud of bubbles, and just before the Doctor grabbed the glowing CPU, he saw Harrison’s little feet kicking for all they were worth, propelling himself and Clara towards the surface.

 *          *          *          *          *

Harrison Sadler’s mother pressed a large plaster over the graze on Clara’s arm. “Are you sure you don’t need to see a doctor? We could drive you to the hospital.”

Harrison’s father agreed. “It would be no trouble.”

Clara glanced at the Doctor, who was sitting on a picnic blanket next to Harrison. The boy watched, fascinated, as the Doctor dissembled the CPU into its component parts.

“Thanks, but no, I’m good,” Clara said. “You’ve got one brave little boy there.”

Harrison’s mother smiled warmly, and looked proudly at her son. “He’s usually so shy, but he seems to like your friend.”

The Doctor passed Harrison a small, bright blue stone that he’d taken from the CPU.

“What is it?” Harrison said.

“It’s quite safe,” the Doctor replied, glancing at Clara. “It’s just to remind you of the day you were a hero.” The little boy beamed and grasped the stone in his hand.

The sun had almost dried Clara’s clothes when she noticed the Doctor hovering over her.

“We should go. Get you back to face Linda,” he said.

Clara groaned. Really, what was the point of having a time machine if you couldn’t put off things like _that_.

Before they left, Clara squatted down in front of Harrison. “You saved my life today. I’ll never forget it.” She folded him into a hug.

He grinned. “I won’t forget you, either,” he said.

*          *          *          *          *

Back in the TARDIS, Clara glanced at the Doctor as he set the coordinates. Harrison Sadler wasn’t the only one who had saved her life today.

“Um. I appreciated the oxygen,” she said.

The Doctor, busy at the console, didn’t look up. “Least I could do. After you dived down there to fix my mistake.”

He didn’t seem inclined to add anything further, so, after a moment she asked, “Could we go back to my flat an hour earlier, so I can get a shower and change my clothes?” Then she strode towards him, tapping her fingers along the console as she moved. “Better yet, how about I get changed here, and then we pop off for cocktails on the moon, instead?”

He glanced up with a half-smile. “We can’t go back an hour earlier. Your flat would be rather crowded. He tapped the console. “Very delicate calculations. We have to arrive seconds after we left, or we’ll throw the whole timeline out. Anyway, you have to explain to Linda that she needs to tell Matthew Flint to...”

Clara raised an eyebrow. “To what?”

“Well, tell him you’re busy. Washing your hair,” he said, waving his hand at her bedraggled locks.

Clara sighed. That was true enough. But, what with the sofa fire, chasing the CPU around the TARDIS and almost drowning, she’d had enough drama for one day. She didn’t much feel like having to deal with Linda.

 After the TARDIS landed, Clara peeked out. “You’ve parked in my bedroom?” she exclaimed.

“I didn’t want to risk...”

“Oh, never mind.” The doorbell rang insistently. Clara tapped the Doctor’s chest and squinted at him. “You, stay in here.”

*          *          *          *          *

Clara opened her front door. “Goodness, Clara. What on earth were you up to?” Linda said as she breezed in.

Clara stepped aside. “Come in,” she muttered to Linda’s back. Then she forced a smile. “I’m really busy right now. I need to...”

“Get in the shower and tidy the place up. Yes, I can see that,” Linda said. She barged into the lounge, and stood staring at the spot where the sofa should be. Then she sniffed theatrically. “Have you started _smoking_?”

“Of course not. Look...”

“Well, you just sort yourself out,” Linda said breezily. “I’m off to the market to pick up fresh veg, but I want you at Dad’s twelve sharp. Mr and Mrs Flint, and _Matthew_ , are coming for lunch. Your father agrees with me. It will do you good.”

Clara pulled her fingers through her tangled hair. Her trousers were still crisp from where they’d dried in the sun. She sighed. If she agreed to lunch, perhaps Linda would leave her alone.

“Well, I suppose...”

Clara’s bedroom door burst open. Linda stared at the Doctor, and the Doctor stared at Linda.

Linda blinked several times, opened her mouth, closed it again, and then turned expectantly to Clara.

“Um. Linda, this is…” Clara took a deep breath. She’d faced down Daleks, outwitted an Ice Warrior, and roundly trounced the Sheriff of Nottingham. The Doctor was right. It was high time she stopped letting Linda walk all over her. She cleared her throat. “Linda, this is the Doctor. He’s the same man you met Christmas before last, in a different body. We travel through time and space together and today we saved a whole planet. He’s not my boyfriend...”

“I never thought he was—” Linda exclaimed.

“—But he’s the only man I want in my life right now. Stop trying to fix me up. I’m perfectly happy with how things are!”

 “Really, Clara.” Linda sniffed and tossed her hair. “In what reality do you expect me to believe that nonsense?”

“Reality is subjective at the best of times,” the Doctor said. He nodded towards the bedroom door. “Would you like to see my time machine?”

Linda blanched. “I can see you’re busy. Far be it for me to intrude. I’ll see myself out.” She flounced toward the door.

“Oh, Doctor, you’ve done it now.” Clara couldn’t stop laughing.

The Doctor grinned. “How about cocktails on the moon?” he said.

He didn’t need to ask twice. Clara headed straight back to the TARDIS.

“Not any old moon though,” the Doctor went on. “The third moon of Fistealia has a cocktail bar looking over the fire mountains, and drinks that glow every colour of the rainbow. How does that sound?” he said.

“That,” Clara said, “sounds amazing.” With the whole of time and space to explore, real life could wait. After all, who wouldn’t choose that?

**Author's Note:**

> If you liked the story, I'd be really grateful for kudos and comments, as well as a follow on social media, if that's your bag.  
> Twitter@KateCol17  
> tumblr@Kate-Coleman-Writes


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